Cure-feature based online trajectory generation in a robotic paint curing system

Ultra-violate (UV) radiation-based robotic paint curing systems have great potential in improving energy efficiency and reducing the operating cost of the traditional oven-based units currently used in the automotive industry. This paper presents and compares two strategies for online trajectory generation in the control of such a robotic paint curing system. The system proposed here incorporates thermal vision feedback from an infra-red (IR) camera to ensure cure quality in the face of changing surface geometries and irradiance characteristics. To compare the two proposed strategies a computer simulation of the robotic curing system is developed. The results indicate that both strategies give comparable cure quality in the face of uneven target characteristics.